Rio Tinto rocked by shipping review decision

Rio Tinto
is seeking an urgent meeting with Environment Minister
Tony Burke
over his decision to consider the potential shipping impact on the Great Barrier Reef of its plan to build a $US1.5 billion ($1.4 billion) bauxite mine in northern Queensland.

After considering “significant new information", Mr Burke said on Thursday he had decided the environmental assessment process for the project near Weipa should now include potential effects on the Great Barrier Reef marine park, World Heritage properties and National Heritage Places.

Rio’s bauxite and alumina president Pat Fiore voiced concern that Mr Burke had made such a “profound decision" based on “unsustained claims" in a one-page Wilderness Society submission.

It could delay board approval of the project and affect its alumina operations, which employ more than 3000 workers in Gladstone.

Rio said shipping of bauxite from Weipa to Gladstone had operated safely for more than 40 years.

But the Wilderness Society said “Rio’s huge new bauxite mine is a major environmental threat . . . the mine will wipe out about 30,000 hectares of forest, dam the Norman Creek, threaten newly-found species of crab and shrimp and dredge about 9 million cubic metres of the marine environment for a new port," it said.

Mr Fiore said the shipping claim was inaccurate. The vast majority of any increased shipping would be north to Asian markets, where Rio would ship unprocessed bauxite to meet Chinese refiner demand.